Basketball rim reducer and rebounder

ABSTRACT

A reducer for a basketball rim has a circular reducer ring having a diameter less than the basketball rim. Rim clips may be slidably positioned on pins extending radially outwardly on the reducer ring. The clips may have a tube section adapted to fit onto the basketball rim. A rebounder may be attached onto the reducer, or to the rim. The rebounder may have a plurality of spokes with outer ends of the spokes attached to a circular rebounder ring and inner ends of the spokes attached to a central hub. The spokes may have at least one concave section and one convex section.

BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION

A standard basketball rim has an inside diameter of about 45.5 cm.Basketball rim reducers are used during shooting practice to reduce theeffective inside diameter of the rim. With the reducer in place on therim, shots must be more accurate to pass through the rim. Use of thereducer can therefore help to train basketball players to shoot moreaccurately.

Basketball rebounders block the rim entirely, causing the ball torebound, optionally on an unpredictable or random trajectory. Reboundersare used to help basketball players practice grabbing a rebounding ball.Although a variety of reducers and rebounders have been designed andused with varying degrees of acceptance and success, the need forimprovements remains.

SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION

A reducer for a basketball rim has a circular reducer ring having adiameter less than the basketball rim. Rim clips may be slidablypositioned on pins extending radially outwardly on the reducer ring. Theclips may have a tube section adapted to fit onto the basketball rim. Arebounder may be attached onto the reducer, or to the rim. The reboundermay have a plurality of spokes with outer ends of the spokes attached toa circular rebounder ring and inner ends of the spokes attached to acentral hub. The spokes may have at least one concave section and oneconvex section.

BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF THE DRAWINGS

In the drawings, the same element number indicates the same element ineach of the views.

FIG. 1 is a perspective view of a reducer and a rebounder assembly on abasketball rim.

FIG. 2 is a top and front perspective view of the reducer and rebounderassembly shown in FIG. 1.

FIG. 3 is a top view of the reducer and rebounder assembly shown in FIG.1.

FIG. 4 is an exploded top and side perspective view of the of thereducer and rebounder assembly shown in FIG. 1.

FIG. 5 is a side view of the of the reducer and rebounder assembly shownin FIG. 1.

FIG. 6 is an enlarged side view of a spoke shown in FIG. 1.

FIG. 7 is an enlarged perspective view of a clip shown in FIG. 1.

DETAILED DESCRIPTION OF THE DRAWINGS

Turning now in detail to the drawings, as shown in FIGS. 1-4, abasketball rim 12 is supported on a rim bracket 14 attached to abackboard 10. The backboard 10 is typically mounted on a pole or wall,or suspended from a ceiling structure, with the rim at a standard heightof 305 cm. A net or chains 16 are generally attached to the rim 12. Areducer and rebounder assembly includes a reducer 20 and a rebounder 50which may be attached to the reducer 20 or directly to the rim 12.

The reducer 20 includes a reducer ring 20 which may be a tube having anouter diameter of e.g. 1-2.5 cm formed into a circle. For use with astandard basketball rim having a 46 cm inside diameter and a 23 cmdiameter standard basketball, the reducer ring is provided with aninside diameter usually in the range of 36-40 cm. As shown in FIG. 4,the reducer ring 20 may include pins 34 extending radially outwardly. Inthe example shown, four equally spaced apart pins 34 are used. A clip 24is supported on each pin 34. Referring now also to FIG. 7, the clip 24may have a sector plate 36 adapted to fit around an outer surface and alower surface of the reducer ring 20. Hence the sector plate 36 maycurve in three dimensions.

A tube section 26 of the clip 24 is joined to the sector plate 36 by apin tube 28 having a pin hole 32. Vertical and horizontal gussets 30 mayalso be joined with the tube section 26, the pin tube 28 and the sectorplate 36 to stiffen and strengthen the clip 24. The tube section 26 hasa down facing opening and an inside curvature which may be adapted toreceive the reducer ring 22. For this purpose the tube section 26 mayhave an inside diameter nominally smaller than the diameter of the ringreducer tube.

When the clip 24 is pressed onto the ring reducer 22, the opposite sidesof the tube section 26 may flex outwardly slightly to allow the clip 24to move onto the reducer ring 22, with the opposite sides thenresiliently flexing back to their original positions, to secure the cliponto the reducer ring 22. The sector plate 36 may have an up facingopening, or curved surface, in contrast to the down facing opening ofthe tube section 26. Referring momentarily to FIG. 5, the clip 24 may bedimensioned so that the center line 40 of the reducer ring 22 is spacedradially inwardly by dimension RR from the center line of the rim 12,with RR ranging from ring 2.5 to 5.5 cm.

The reducer 20 is installed on a rim 12 by snapping the clips over andaround the reducer ring 22. To compensate to slight variations in rimdiameter, the clip 24 may be moved radially inwardly or outwardly bysliding the clip 24 on the pin 34. The pins may be 1-2 cm long. Usingpins 2 cm long may allow for clip movement of up to about 1 cm. The clip24 may be captive on the pin via retention collars or other techniques.As shown in FIGS. 5 and 7, the top surfaces 42 and 44 of the clips 24may be aligned in a plane to better avoid affecting rebound trajectoriesof missed shots that hit the clips. Referring to FIG. 3, the insidediameter ID of the reducer ring 22 determines the accuracy required fora shot to pass through the rim 112 for a score. The diameter ID may beselected based on the shots to be practiced, player skill level, orother factors.

As shown in FIG. 2, the rebounder 50 may be attached to the reducer ring22 using clips 60 similar to the clips 24. One of the clips 60 may bereplaced with a fin clip 70 having a vertical fin 72. The fin clip 70may otherwise be the same as the clip 60. If used, the fin clip 70 maypositioned over the rim bracket 14 to help prevent the ball from gettingstuck on top of the rim bracket 14.

Referring to FIGS. 2, 3 and 5, the rebounder 50 may include a pluralityof spokes attached to a rebounder ring 52. The rebounder ring 52 may beprovided as a solid wire formed into a circle having a diameter of about27-33 cm. In the example shown, eight radial spokes are used, with theouter ends of the spokes attached to the rebounder ring 52 and with theinner ends of the spokes joined to a central hub 66. The rebounder ring,the hub and the spokes may be joined by welding. The central hub 66 mayhave a flat top with a diameter or largest principal dimension of 1-5cm.

As shown in FIG. 5, the hub may be vertically spaced above thecenterline 40 of the rebounder ring 52 by a dimension HH of 4-6 cm. Someor all of the spokes may be clip spokes 56 with a clip segment 58extending beyond the rebounder ring 52, with a clip 60 on the outer endof the clip segment 58. The remaining spokes may be ring spokes 54 withouter ends terminating at the rebounder ring 52. The clips 60 may bemoveable radially inward or outward, over a range of e.g., 5 mm, toallow the clips 60 attach onto rims of slightly varying diameters, wherethe rebounder 50 is also designed for use without the rim reducer 20.

Turning to FIGS. 5 and 6, all of the spokes 54 and/or 56 may optionallyhave the same shape and dimensions, except for the clip segment 58, ifused. All of the spokes may be straight when viewed from above as inFIG. 3, and may correspond to a radius of the rebounder ring 54. One ormore of the spokes, or all of the spokes, may have at least one convexor down curving segment 86 and one concave or up-facing segment 92.These segments 86 and 92 may be adjoining as shown in FIG. 6.

An additional convex segment 94 may be joined to the hub and to theinner end of the concave segment 92. An additional concave segment 84may be joined to the convex segment 86. If used, the outer end of thesegment 84 may be joined to a clip segment 58, or the outer end of thesegment 84 may have a straight section attached to and/or terminating atthe rebounder ring 52. Similarly, if used, the segment 94 may have astraight section adjoining the hub. In the example of FIG. 6, the spokehas alternating concave and convex segments 84, 86, 92 and 94. In thisdesign, segment 94 may have a larger radius of curvature, followed inorder by segments 92, 84 and 86. The peak PP of the segment 86 may be50-80% or 65-75% of the height of the top surface TT of the hub,measuring from the center line 40 of the rebounder ring 52.

Thus a novel basketball reducer and a rebounder have been shown anddescribed. Various changes and substitutions may of course be madewithout departing from the spirit and scope of the invention. Theinvention, therefore, should not be limited except by the followingclaims and their equivalents.

1. A reducer for a basketball rim, comprising: a circular reducer ringhaving a diameter less than the basketball rim; a plurality of spacedapart radial pins; and a rim clip slidably positioned on each radialpin, with each rim clip having a tube section adapted to fit onto thebasketball rim.
 2. The reducer of claim 1 with the rim reducercomprising a tube formed into a circle and with each rim clip having asector plate curving around an outer surface and a lower surface of thereducer ring.
 3. The reducer of claim 2 with the sector plate curving intwo dimensions to substantially conform to the outer surface and thelower surface of the reducer ring.
 4. The reducer of claim 1 with eachrim clip captive on a radial pin.
 5. The reducer of claim 1 whereinsubstantially each radial pin is 0.5-2 cm long.
 6. The reducer of claim1 with the a centerline of the reducer ring 2.5 to 5.5 cm radiallyinwardly of a centerline of the tube sections of the rim clips.
 7. Thereducer of claim 1 with the reducer ring having an outside diameter of40-42.5 cm.
 8. The reducer of claim 1 with the rim clips removable fromthe reducer ring.
 9. A rebounder assembly for a basketball rim,comprising: a rim reducer including a circular reducer ring and aplurality of spaced apart a rim clips each slidably positioned on a clippin projecting radially outwardly from the reducer ring, and with eachrim clip having a tube section adapted to fit onto the basketball rim;and a rebounder including a circular rebounder ring having a pluralityof spokes, with each spoke having an outer end attached to the rebounderring, and an inner end attached to a hub centered within the rebounderring, and with each spoke having at least one concave section and oneconvex section.
 10. The rebounder assembly of claim 9 with each spokecurving in only two dimensions.
 11. The rebounder of claim 9 withsubstantially each spoke having inner and outer convex sections joinedon opposite ends of a concave section.
 12. A rebounder for a basketballrim, comprising: a circular rebounder ring having a plurality of spokes,with substantially each spoke having an outer end attached to therebounder ring, and an inner end attached to a hub, and with each spokehaving at least one concave section and one convex section.
 13. Therebounder of claim 12 wherein the hub and the rebounder ring have acommon central axis.
 14. The rebounder of claim 12 with one or more ofthe spokes including inner and outer convex sections on opposite sidesof a concave section.
 15. The rebounder of claim 14 including fourspokes having a clip segment extending radially outwardly beyond therebounder ring.
 16. The rebounder of claim 12 with the rebounder ringlying in a first plane, and with the spokes having curvature in a secondplane perpendicular to the first plane.
 17. The rebounder of claim 12wherein substantially each spoke comprises a radial spoke.
 18. Therebounder of claim 12 wherein a top surface of the hub is 3.5 to 7 cmabove a centerline of the rebounder ring.
 19. The rebounder of claim 12comprising eight equally spaced apart spokes with four non-adjacentspokes including a clip segment extending radially beyond the rebounderring.
 20. The rebounder of claim 12 with substantially each spokecomprising a metal wire having a diameter of 4-8 mm.